Has real potential... hopefully he makes this work. I wondered why he was not at ACFC.
Surely he's our number two now behind moss : )
Turned 32 last month:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tamati_Williams
Thought he was great in the 2014 Club World Cup in Morocco.
Will be close competition between him and Marinovic for the NZ #2 jersey.
RKC will value an experienced keeper his age because they have four very young keepers in the first team squad aged 18 - 20:
http://nl.soccerway.com/teams/netherlands/rkc-waal...
Williams will probably start as third choice keeper at RKC behind first choice Ralph Vos aged 19 (21 appearances this season) and Nils de Hartog aged 21 (5 apps).
But because he is older, he could be bumped up to second choice quickly.
They have two other keepers in the squad aged 18 and 20 who have never appeared.
Alarm bells should ring about Williams' continued eligibility to play for NZ because he has acquired a Dutch passport since he last appeared for NZ and the Netherlands don't allow dual nationality.
Could be a similar situation to Fitzgerald in Japan.
That's not true.. dual citizenship is allowed in the Netherlands.
Dual citizenship is only granted in narrow circumstances and is much harder to gain than in many other countries such as NZ.
Generally anyone who wants to adopt Dutch nationality has to give up their original nationality if that is legally possible:
https://www.government.nl/topics/dutch-nationality...
Dutch government: "In principle, you will have to give up any other nationalities. There are some exceptions to this rule."
https://ind.nl/EN/individuals/residence-wizard/dut...
"To become a Dutch citizen, you must be prepared to renounce your current nationality. This means that you have to give up your existing citizenship. When you apply you have to sign a statement indicating that you will give up your existing nationality after you have acquired Dutch citizenship. There are a number of exceptions to this requirement.
If one of the exceptions applies to you, you must inform your local municipality of this upon submitting your application. The IND will then assess whether the exception indicated is indeed applicable to you. Please note, however, that once you have acquired Dutch citizenship you will no longer be able to claim that one of the exceptions is applicable to you."
It's a little complicated due to amendments to Dutch citizenship laws in 1985 and in 2003.
Wiiliams apparently obtained a Dutch passport through having a Dutch grandparent (this is granted only rarely).
It is so complicated to obtain a Dutch passport through a grandparent that Dutch embassies around the world will not advise you on this and state that you must instead get advice from a Dutch immigration lawyer.
Williams obviously employed a very good Dutch lawyer.
His parent of Dutch ancestry is not considered Dutch by the Dutch government.:
Only since 1985 does "every child born of a married Dutch father or mother automatically acquires Dutch nationality, even if he or she is born outside the Netherlands, as does the child of an unmarried Dutch mother.
"Children born before 1 January 1985 of a Dutch mother and a foreign father did not as a rule acquire Dutch nationality by birth.
Nor did children born of a foreign mother and Dutch father."
When I enquired in the 1990's (my father was Dutch-born) about acquiring a Dutch passport, I was told that I would have to renounce my NZ passport.
I think that this generally still applies.
On top of that, anyone with Dutch citizenship who acquired another nationality before 2003 automatically lost their Dutch citizenship.
This happened to my father when he acquired a NZ passport (and Dutch nationals also lose their citizenship for living overseas for ten years or more).
Even now, Dutch citizens automatically lose that citizenship when they acquire another citizenship with strict exceptions as below: